The Horror Geek Speaks: Cannibal Apocalypse

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John Saxon and John Morghen chew more than the scenery in this film.

By Mike Bracken

Of all the subgenres in Italian horror and exploitation cinema, I think the cannibal film is my favorite. Inspired by the mondo documentaries of the 1960s and '70s, the cannibal film is a subgenre that truly pushed the boundaries of good taste. And while the cannibal craze would last less than a decade (being replaced by the zombie film in the early 1980s), film fans were treated to a number of magnificent, violent, and overtly gory films during that time. While many will cite Ruggero Deodato's Cannibal Holocaust or Umberto Lenzi's Cannibal Ferox as the crown jewels of this cinematic movement, there were no shortage of other entertaining cannibal films as well. Image Entertainment has released one of them on DVD &#Array; Antonio Margheriti's Cannibal Apocalypse.

Margheriti's film is a bit of a departure from the traditional cannibal films. In those movies, the setting was often the jungle, where white folks who were out of their element would find themselves becoming lunch for various lost tribes of stone-age flesh eaters. Cannibal Apocalypse, however, takes us out of the jungle and puts the man-eating action in an American city of all places. This new locale provides an interesting change of pace for a genre that seems to be relatively limited in terms of narrative scope. And, if nothing else, it provides an opportunity for Margheriti to sort of merge the cannibal and zombie subgenres (in a way that isn't quite as obvious as Marino Girolami's Zombi Holocaust.

Cannibal Apocalype tells the tale of Norman Hopper (John Saxon). As the opening segment shows us, Hopper was in Vietnam, fighting for the good old USA. While in 'Nam, he rescues two captured American P.O.W.s &#Array; Charles Bukowski (John Morghen a.k.a. Giovanni Lombardo Radice) and Tom Thompson (Tony King). Unfortunately, Hopper doesn't realize that the two prisoners have developed a taste for human flesh while in captivity &#Array; at least not until Thompson bites a huge chunk out of his arm.

Hopper and the two men return to Atlanta after the war, but none of them realize that the cannibalistic tendencies from Vietnam have come back with them &#Array; at least not until Bukowksi goes psycho and chomps down on a woman in a crowded movie theater. It turns out that the cannibalism is like a disease &#Array; anyone bit by one of the carriers will then become a cannibal as well. It's up to the Atlanta police to hunt down Hopper, Bukowski, and Thompson before they can start a plague.

One of the interesting things about the Italian cannibal cycle was the way that these almost purely exploitative films managed to infuse their narratives with a fair amount of thematic material. While said thematic material rarely rose above the level of questioning just who the real monsters were &#Array; the white men or the cannibals who often reverted to eating people after enduring humiliation and degradation at the hands of the civilized world &#Array; it's still rather interesting to see movies that appear to exist solely as violent and gory examples of pure exploitation cinema tackle any kind of issues. Margheriti's film seems to take this even a step further, adding some thematic material dealing with the nature of war in general and the Vietnam experience in particular.

That Hopper, Bukowski, and Thompson come back from 'Nam as different men than those who originally went there is beyond debate. However, the cannibalism really seems to work as a nicely crafted metaphor about the alienation that many veterans report to have felt after being involved with America's most unpopular war. Unfortunately, while this material is there, Margheriti and screenwriter Jimmy Gould never explore it quite as fully as they could. Of course, this is a low-budget Italian exploitation film, so maybe we shouldn't expect too much to begin with.

One of the main reasons that the film works as well as it does is thanks to the performances of Saxon and John Morghen. Both actors are legends in Italian cinema, Saxon for his work with filmmakers like the late Mario Bava and Morghen for being arguably the hardest dying man in showbiz. Morghen is the perennial whipping boy of Italian genre cinema, an actor who often dies in films in the most gruesome ways imaginable. Cannibal Apocalypse is no exception, although Morghen's death here is tamer than his suffering in films like City of the Living Dead or Cannibal Ferox. Both actors turn in fine performances here and add a great deal of legitimacy to the film as a whole.

Couple those fine performances with solid direction from Antonio Margheriti (whose work has influenced modern filmmakers such as Quentin Tarantino) and you wind up with a film that's quite good despite existing almost solely as an exploitation flick. Margheriti's direction is competent and assured throughout, although he does let the pace flag a bit in some of the early segments.

Gore fans should be pleased with the FX work of Italian gore legend Giannetto De Rossi, who manages to make each and every gore sequence in the film memorable. Particularly impressive is a sequence near the end of the film wherein one character has his entire midsection blown out by a shotgun blast.

Image Entertainment has released Cannibal Apocalypse on DVD. This new version of the film is the definitive release, with all the gore sequences that had been removed over the years restored. The picture is crisp, with the film presented in a widescreen aspect ratio. Sound is excellent as well. It's nice to finally be able to trash my grainy old bootleg of this film for the magnificent new DVD.

Image has also offered up a great batch of extras that are sure to please fans of the film. Most entertaining is an hour-long documentary entitled Cannibal Apocalypse Redux which features extensive interview footage with John Saxon, John Morghen, and Antonio Margheriti. It's a fun and informative chat with all three men about this film, as well as some of their past work. One can only hope that John Morghen's plea for more work in America will be answered. Other extras include the butchered American opening of the film, a featurette about all of the cuts made to Cannibal Apocalypse over the years, and a few trailers. All in all, an excellent package. Thank god companies like Image are devoted to getting these obscure films DVD releases.

Ultimately, Cannibal Apocalypse is one of the more interesting films in the Italian cannibal film canon. While it's not quite as classic as Deodato's seminal Cannibal Holocaust, it is an interesting re-interpretation of the traditional cannibal film. The fact that it features John Morghen and John Saxon &#Array; two of cult cinema's greatest icons &#Array; in starring roles only makes it that much better. Kudos to Image for making this little seen film available on DVD. Cannibal Apocalypse is a gut munching good time.